Old Times and Stuff

When I was growing up my little town had a two room school. There were 16 kids that started first grade and went all the way through high school together. We were a pretty close knit group, and once we had to transfer from our little two room school to the Big City school in 7th grade, we stuck even closer together. Years after high school graduation I was told by several Big City friends that they always envied us 16 Small Town kids because we always had each other - good, sincere friends.


After high school everyone did their thing, college, military service, etc., and then got married and raised families. Of those 16 kids, 9 of us eventually came back to this community to live - some in our Small Town and several in the Big City just 7 miles away. Over the years we've run into each other by chance - you know - the grocery store, restaurants, etc., and would visit a bit and always make the promise to each other that we were going to get together. You know how that goes - it just never happens.


Well, last night it did. A couple of days ago I got a call from one of the girls that "the girls" were planning a get together at a local establishment for Happy Hour and a good gossip session. There are five of us girls in the area. And we had a wonderful time reminiscing about school days, boyfriends, our adult lives, our kids, our husbands, you name it, we covered it. Unfortunately there should have been 7 of us instead of just the 5. There are a couple of sad stories that go along with this group.


By the way, the pictures below were taken in 6th grade - before we made the jump to the Big City school. I guess we must have been about 11 or 12 at the time, huh?



There were two sets of twins among the 16 kids. Above, left to right are Barb and Bev, obviously identical twins, and to the right is Carol. Carol and Barb were with us last night, but Bev died 9 years ago from thyroid cancer. Barb says she still feels like her right arm has been cut off, even after all these years.


Barb is still married to her college sweetheart, has two daughters and several grandchildren. I don't remember how many at this point. Carol has been married three times. Her first husband committed suicide, and the next two just weren't the right ones. She has two children and grandchildren up in their late 20s.




Doreen(top), a fraternal twin to Donna(bottom). Donna and Doreen were as different as night and day, not only in appearance but in personality also. Doreen was always pretty happy go luck and Donna was always serious. Doreen had a long, blond, curly, ponytail, and Donna had almost black, straight hair that she also wore in a ponytail. Doreen had freckles and Donna had very swarthy skin. Doreen died 21 years ago from skin cancer. She had a spot on the back of her arm that she didn't know she had and by the time she found it, it had already metastisized into her lymph nodes. How sad. She left two young children, and a husband who still has not recovered from her death.

Donna was married several years out of high school to a military man, and that didn't work out. She lived on the east coast at that time, but moved to Nebraska following her divorce. She lived with a man for 26 years but they never married. Then one day he came home from work and informed her that he had met someone else, packed his things and moved out. She was devastated. Shortly after that she decided to move back here where her friends were and her mother still lived. Her mother is getting up in years and Donna thought she should live closer. So she just moved back here last February.

Donna, Doreen and I spent a lot of time together when we were kids. Lots of sleep overs, double dating, etc.

This is Chris. We both got married within months of each other, lived about a mile apart, and had our daughters about two months apart. Our daughters grew up and played together a lot until Chris got a divorce from her husband and moved to the Big City where she was a kindergarten teacher.

I shouldn't even post this picture - it's so terrible. That's me in 6th grade - I looked like a toothpick. Wish I did now - but then that's another story.

Anyway, we had such a great time we decided we're going to do this on a monthly basis. Our next meeting is already scheduled.

Three of the four guys in our "group" are still in the area. One is a truck driver, another a big farmer and the third owns one of the saloons in town. Not the Watering Hole - the other one. So I see the farmer and the saloon owner frequently. The truck driver is on the road a lot, so I rarely see him.

It's really nice to have all these long-time friends.